She's had a stressful day.

Laura walks into the living room, shutting the door behind her. She shrugs off her backpack, letting it fall to the floor with a thump. "Hey, Sam," she says with an exhausted air, as she unzips and hangs up her puffy white winter jacket. Then she plods over to the couch, and practically falls into it next to you, her legs splaying apart in a distinctly un-ladylike manner. Like yesterday, she's wearing her usual skinny blue jeans; today, she's paired a V-neck pullover top with it -- white with a pattern of little blue flowers -- complimented by a simple white scrunchie wrapped around her ponytail. She wears pink lipstick and nail polish, and a bit of blush, but on the whole she's always tended to keep the makeup relatively light.

As she fwomps down, you catch a brief sniff of the perfume she usually wears -- or, heck, maybe it's just deodorant, you honestly don't know -- and it tickles your nose with just the faintest floral scent, barely there. It briefly makes your heart flutter and your vision get all hazy, until you remind yourself that this is your sister sitting next to you. You clear your throat, and sit a little more upright.

"Whew, rough day?" you remark to her, equal parts sibling teasing and genuine concern. It's basically your usual tone with her, and frankly you're thankful that your relationship with her isn't contentious like so many horror stories you've heard other folks with siblings talk about online. The two of you have never exactly understood one another; you've always been withdrawn, anxious, disorganized, and extremely technically oriented, while she's been outgoing, relaxed, meticulously put together, and artistic. But you still manage to get along, and you wonder if the **** of your father at such an early age for the two of you had something to do with it. Being in daycare together so much, you tended to get very protective of one another, and relied on each other for emotional support. At least some good might have come out of that senseless tragedy, you think.

Your sister nods, sighing as she bends over to untie her sneakers and kick off her shoes. "We had a test in math today, and I'm not sure I did all that great on it," she explains. "Plus I managed to spill my soda all over the place during lunch; I swear, half the cafeteria stood up and applauded."

"Oof," you reply, knowingly. God knows the number of times you did something embarrassing at school and got some unwanted attention. You wonder how different it is for her, though; she's so popular and well-liked by everybody. Was the cheering as derisive as it was for you? Or were they all being playfully teasing instead? Probably the latter, you think, but you're sure it's still an awkward thing to go through.

"Then," she continues, exasperated, "no matter what I tried I just couldn't get my perspective right in art class. I struggled with that composition for a damned hour and got absolutely nowhere on it. Every time I fixed one thing something else fell apart." She frowns and looks down at her feet. "I'll probably have to just start from scratch."

"I see," you interject, nodding sagely, and she looks over at you with a half-smile: exactly the reaction you had hoped for.

"No, you don't," she sighs.

"No, I don't," you echo, still nodding sagely, and now she smiles a bit more. She knows damned well that you have utterly no artistic aptitude whatsoever, your talent limited to drawing those three-dimensional cubes in the margins of your notebooks, and weird squiggly designs all over when you're unable to concentrate and bored to tears in class. "You'll figure it out, though," you assure her. "You were probably still frustrated from earlier in the day."

"Yeah, you're probably right," she admits, while grabbing the remote and turning the television on. The big old CRT clicks, and you hear the familiar high-pitched whine of its flyback transformer as it warms up. You've heard that people stop hearing that when they get older and they gradually lose their ability to perceive high frequencies. That saddens you a bit; it's weird, but that sound has always been a bit comforting to you, a sort of aural blanket making you feel safe and secure. You'd hate to lose it. But then, who knows if TVs and monitors will even be the same twenty years from now? you think.

The television flips on, and -- speak of the future -- it happens to be showing a rerun of Star Trek: The Next Generation. "Oh my god, it's this one," your sister snorts with a half-laugh. It's a particularly bad episode, an infamous bit of first-season dreck where the Enterprise visits a sex planet and Wesley is sentenced to **** for messing up a flower bed. It definitely falls into the "so bad it's good" category, even for your sister; she's not really into science fiction, but she's certainly familiar with Star Trek thanks to growing up with you, and she does love to make fun of it. It used to annoy you when you were a bit younger and took the show Dreadfully Seriously, but nowadays you've learned to embrace every aspect of the show, even the super embarrassing and campy bits. And although her knowledge of the show is mostly cursory, this particular episode is so incredibly campy, it tends to stick in one's memory.

On the television, the crew is being introduced to a very toned, very shiny, blond-haired, blue-eyed man and woman, each of whom are wearing little more than white sheets tied strategically about their bodies. The woman's hair has been permed to the point of no return, and is so curly it looks like her head would bounce if she laid down on a pillow.

"Ah yes, the Aryan Sex Planet," you mutter, which elicits another laugh from her.

"God, they were so horny in these early episodes," Laura laughs.

"Well, Roddenberry was still in charge then, and it seems like he was a really horny dude," you remark.

"Yeah, well, sometimes I'm amazed they even got away with this," she replies, as you both watch two women rubbing down an oiled-up man wearing only a loincloth and lying prone on a table. "It's practically softcore porn."

"He was an... interesting individual," you say. "On one hand, he honestly seemed to believe in a future where racial and gender boundaries didn't exist... and on the other hand, he seemed to think the way to do that was to have everybody fuck everybody else all the time."

Your comment elicits a burst of somewhat-surprised laughter from Laura, as she looks over at you. "Wow, Sam, did you just say 'fuck'? That's unusual coming from you! I mean, when you aren't pissed off."

You look inward for a bit, pondering all that has happened recently. "It's... been a really strange day," you mutter, pleasantly but pensively. Your sister continues to look at you, curious and waiting for you to continue.